"I can't speak for production, but I really like that people see us when we're traveling around the world. If you're a fan of the show, ... you're going to be more excited because you want to see what happens."Phil Keoghan

Oh the competition and sassiness begins! Sarah wrote a note & caption about one of the RFF (you guys are so good!) pics over on the facebook group--the one with the starting lane.

Here's the note: "I posted a photo of us running off the starting line (WHAT?!?) and pls note that I am far and away the first girl up those @#$%ing steps. No other chick is even close and I am solidly in the boy part of the pack." And the caption: "Order up the stairs: boy, boy, boy, boy, SARAH, boy, boy, boy, all the other girls." There are not even that many boys, so she's clearly proud...and sassy! Super cute. She is a serious physical competitor (one weekend we were supposed to hang out and we were talking about her other plans and she was like, "I don't know, I might do this triathalon...", What??? I had never heard of such a thing). I'm so curious how that will play out on the show!

Do you like these little updates??? Or are they boring...I only want to delight the happiest forum of all time.

I'm sure this is mentioned somewhere else on the board, but I just discovered this new promo video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB0YFmYB6yo. Terence and Sarah are a little tense in here. My god, I can't imagine how hard it would be to do these challenges with a boyfriend/girlfriend and have it all taped, edited, and on international television. Holy c&^%! More brave than me these two! And super cute how they're clearly stressed and using "I love you" and "babe."

Awesome pics! I've posted them over on the Terence & Sarah blog. http://terenceandsarah.typepad.com/. Please let me know if there's anything else you require for credit. I want to be super respectful as I so appreciate all you do here!

It was super cool to see an article on BuddyTV saying that Terence and Sarah are going to win the race. I did a tiny blog entry about it, here it is:

Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer, wrote yesterday that it is a matter of simple science that our favorites, Terence and Sarah, will take it all in The Amazing Race 13. Awesome. Dahl analyzed who has won the race in the past and based on that said, "Go to Vegas and bet the rent on Terence and Sarah. It's a good investment." No really, he said that! He called our friends, "young, happy and active" and they are the only pair of the 11 teams with their picture in the article. How cool is that?

He looks like a keeper, Sarah! Y'all look like a great team that will be so much fun to watch!

Logged

"I can't speak for production, but I really like that people see us when we're traveling around the world. If you're a fan of the show, ... you're going to be more excited because you want to see what happens."Phil Keoghan

"I can't speak for production, but I really like that people see us when we're traveling around the world. If you're a fan of the show, ... you're going to be more excited because you want to see what happens."Phil Keoghan

"I can't speak for production, but I really like that people see us when we're traveling around the world. If you're a fan of the show, ... you're going to be more excited because you want to see what happens."Phil Keoghan

Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2008Potomac native to star in globe-trotting reality showWinston Churchill graduate will appear on this season of ‘The Amazing Race'Potomac native Sarah Leshner will never forget where she was when she got the phone call from CBS informing her that she would be on the upcoming season of "The Amazing Race."

Leshner, 31, a Wall Street investment analyst and graduate of Winston Churchill High School, was on the corner of East 45th Street and Madison Avenue in New York City, where she lives with her boyfriend, running coach Terence Gerchberg, 35. The call confirmed that the couple would be headed off to tape the 13th installment of the reality show, which pits teams of two against each other in a multinational competition for $1 million. "We were ecstatic — we were screaming," Leshner said. "Every time we walk past that corner, it has special significance."

During the show, competitors travel around the world in teams, searching for their own accommodations and booking their own travel arrangements in a globe-spanning race for the prize money. The couple decided to apply, they said, because they had all of the attributes of the winning teams of past seasons. "We're smart, physically fit, well-traveled, and we work well together, except when we're fighting," Leshner said.

The two recently traveled together to Russia with barely enough time to get their visas in order, according to Gerchberg. "Everyone tells us, you guys travel like you're on that show, ‘The Amazing Race,'" Gerchberg said.

This season, 11 teams will travel more than 30,000 miles over five continents, beginning at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the location of the 1932 and 1984 Olympics, according to CBS. The teams include married couples, long-distance daters, fraternity brothers, comic book aficionados, and organic blueberry farmers, to name a few.

"There was a hippie team and Terence decided they were going to be our biggest competition because they can travel around the world without any possessions," Leshner said.

To prepare, Gerchberg and Leshner scoured old episodes, examining the types of challenges that were imposed on contestants and tried to simulate them. They snow-shoed, rock-climbed, and even milked goats. They bought backpacks early on and went running with the gear fully loaded. They especially had to consider what might happen if that they were forced to stray from their dietary restrictions — Leshner keeps strictly kosher, while Gerchberg is a vegetarian.

But the couple also knew that the competition would be especially challenging emotionally. The two had only been dating a few months when they began the application process, and their family had already expressed concern that the two were too different to be compatible.

Gerchberg leads a laid-back lifestyle coaching runners and selling real estate, while Leshner works 14-hour days on Wall Street.

"We knew it would be a huge test on us, but we had reached a point where we need to make a decision one way or the other," Leshner said.

As for how the two measured up, CBS is keeping any details of what happened during the taping of the show strictly under wraps. However, viewers at home will soon be able to watch Leshner and Gerchberg come to life on the small screen— the show premieres Sept. 28.

Leshner said she's a bit more nervous than her boyfriend about how she will come across on television.

"I think we were so confident in our abilities going on the Race we never thought about the fights we might get into or the frustrations we might encounter or the embarrassing things we might do," Leshner said. Going into a situation where television audiences can make snap decisions about a person's character with little information to go on is also a concern, she said.

Though the two haven't decided where the relationship might take them in the future, they feel "The Amazing Race" strengthened them as a couple.

"I'm waiting for her to propose to me," Gerchberg joked.

He said that the two learned a lot about each other in the process. "Now we have something that very few people can share, and that's a beautiful thing."

The 13th installment of the Amazing Race will premiere at 8 p.m., Sept. 28, on CBS.

I've been offline for way too long but look what inspired me to post! Profile of Terence and Sarah in a SC-area paper. Looks like Terence's mom lives there...?

I agree with the journalist in being nervous that their intensity seems like it could be an issue, but they are sooo cute. They milked cows? And hitchhiked?!? Love them.

Couple with local ties to be on 'Amazing Race'By DANIEL BROWNSTEINdbrownstein@islandpacket.com843-706-8125Published Monday, September 22, 2008

Terence Gerchberg can't tell his mother where he's been or what he did.

Instead, Susan Citron, who retired to Hilton Head Island 15 years ago, will find out the answers to those questions along with the rest of the world by watching national television.

Terence Gerchberg, 35, and his 32-year-old girlfriend Sarah Leshner, both of New York City, are one of 11 teams competing for $1 million on the 13th season of CBS' "The Amazing Race," which begins anew next Sunday.

The reality show mixes brains with physical challenges as the teams -- which each have unique personal stories -- travel the world completing tasks and following clues that will get them to their next destination. A team is eliminated on each episode.

The show filmed in April and May, but contestants are strictly forbidden from telling anyone how they've done. The contestants traveled 30,000 miles across five continents in 23 days, making the show's first stops at a floating city, Cambodia and Kazakhstan.

"For me, at least, it's the biggest secret I've kept, but it's also the easiest," said Gerchberg in a phone interview along with Leshner last week. "You don't want to spoil it for anybody."

The couple are billed as "Opposites Attract" because Leshner is a workaholic financial analyst on Wall Street, while Gerchberg sells real estate to make ends meet while pursuing his real passion for running marathons and coaching other runners.

Because both are in top physical shape, some fans already have picked them as favorites, but the couple's intensity and competitiveness could just as easily backfire and end in a mid-challenge meltdown.

The show often tests the foundations of relationships, evident in the spats and reconciliations that are nearly as captivating as the race itself.

There's also another factor that could come into play. Both Gerchberg and Leshner have significant dietary restrictions. Gerchberg is a vegetarian and Leshner keeps kosher.

"We just said, 'We're competitive people,' " recalled Leshner. "'We're in this to win and we're going to face each challenge as it comes along.'"

They're up against comic book geeks, pink-clad blonde Southern belles from Columbia (one of whom is a University of South Carolina journalism student), frat boys, aging hippies, a mother and son, and an ex-NFL player and his estranged CEO wife, to name a few.

It was Gerchberg's idea to audition for the show.

He had show business aspirations when he lived in southern California with his mother. He played a skateboarder who said "awesome" in a KFC commercial that was probably only shown a handful of times after being upstaged by MC Hammer's version of the ad. He was also an extra on early 1990s television shows, including "Saved by the Bell."

The couple shot a tape showing their major differences and mailed it off with, true to form, quite a difference in expectations.

"We never, ever thought we would get chosen," Leshner said.

"No, I thought we would be chosen," Gerchberg corrected her.

"That's true, you're the eternal optimist," quipped Leshner. "We don't live in LA. We don't have an agent. We were totally ourselves. At the end of the process, we said, 'You'd either love us or hate us ... .' "

They flew to California for a week of more in-depth interviews, but still screamed on a New York street corner when they got the phone call that they were selected.

For the next six weeks, Gerchberg and Leshner studied past episodes for ideas about what they might encounter. They trained by running and rowing with backpacks on, studying maps, learning to milk a cow, rock climbing, hitchhiking and asking random strangers for help (something they'll definitely have to do on the show).

"It became our full-time job," Leshner said. "We wanted to prepare in ways no other team would even think of."

Gerchberg and Leshner had been dating for about six months when the show filmed. They viewed it as a make-or-break test of their relationship, one that could have easily ended with a parting of ways.

"We functioned well, we functioned not well," Gerchberg said. "It was like the ocean. We were up and down. You never know what's going to happen."

But, the couple says they're still together.

"It's a really great, real show," Gerchberg said. "At no point did we feel anything other than it being a real race around the world. It was an incredible experience and I'm really glad I got to share it with an amazing woman."

During the race, Citron, Gerchberg's mom, got phone calls once a week from the production company containing virtually no information.

"They would call once a week and say he's fine," she said. "They wouldn't tell you where he was or what he was doing. I'm going to be sitting here in shock when the show airs. I'm going to be floored."

New Yorkers Sarah Leshner and Terence Gerchberg seem like they're winners - after making it through CBS's 'The Amazing Race,' they still like each other!He's a hard-core fitness fanatic who says what's on his mind regardless of the consequences.

She's a feisty former Wall Street analyst who has traveled the world and wears her emotions on her sleeve.

Meet Terence Gerchberg and Sarah Leshner, a New York couple whose experiences competing against 10 other teams in an around-the-world test of endurance and cunning on CBS' hit show "The Amazing Race" will premiere Sunday night.

The reality show, in its 13th season, took contestants across five continents, and proved to be a severe test for Gerchberg and Leshner's budding relationship.

"We had a lot of drama," Leshner, 31, told the Daily News. "We're very hysterical and very intense, and whatever was going on, we were screaming."

After dating for just a couple of months, Gerchberg, 35, and Leshner went on a hastily planned trip to Russia and Latvia last year.

Their friends marveled at how well they traveled together, prompting one pal to suggest that the new couple try out for the show. Days later, Gerchberg, a marathon runner, had downloaded the application materials and began filming an audition video that turned out better than either expected.

"We're definitely going to get picked," Gerchberg told Leshner at the time.

After the call came this March, the couple began a training regimen that was part boot camp, part "Little House on the Prairie." They worked out nearly every day, hitchhiked across Pennsylvania, milked cows and climbed a mountain.

Gerchberg and Leshner also became students of the show. They watched every episode from every season and even went so far as to draw up spreadsheets detailing all of the different types of challenges.

Still, once the competition began, they realized one crucial component had been left out of their preparation: sleep-deprivation training. At times, the stress and frustration felt by the couple boiled over, bringing Leshner to tears on more than one occasion.

"Until we got into a groove, which I do think we got into, it was just too much," Leshner said. "I couldn't believe we had such a bad dynamic."

In the end, though, their love survived - a little bit stronger and a little bit scarred. "It gave us hope, and it gave us concern," Gerchberg said.

For Leshner, the experience traveling in some of the world's poorest communities convinced her to drop her banking career and work for a company that focuses on development. "It just felt too strange to return to the Wall Street rat race after the things we had seen and people we had met traveling around the world," Leshner said.